by Samrat Upadhyay ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 9, 2006
Upadhyay's plain prose makes the political crisis all the more affecting.
Familial responsibility butts up against personal desires in these finely crafted stories.
Novelist and short story writer Upadhyay (The Guru of Love, 2003) assembles another fine collection of complex, haunting pieces set in Nepal. The title story juxtaposes the shocking news that Crown Prince Dipendra has shot himself after killing the entire royal family, with the relationship of taxi driver Ganga, who belatedly realizes that his brother Dharma is homosexual. In “The Wedding Hero,” a friendship between three bank workers is strained when two of the trio realize they're both attracted to the lovely Gauri; things backfire when Umesh decides to arrange and finance a coworker's wedding, in an attempt to impress Gauri. In “The Third Stage,” a retired film actor agrees to take part in a feature film to placate his wife and daughter—and realizes that the fantasy world of film is akin to the earthly, illusory world. The importance of family—and the heartbreak that can be found within—is described in “Father, Daughter,” in which a daughter's willful actions challenge a father's notions of caste. In “The Weight of a Gun,” the divorced mother of a grown schizophrenic son unexpectedly finds herself raising her ex-husband's newborn. And a junior accountant comes to realize that spectacular good looks are not necessarily the only thing to look for in a bride, in “Chintamani's Women.” Characters not only maneuver their way through the intricacies of love, but also navigate against the backdrop of Nepal's Maoist guerrillas, fighters who have been orchestrating a nearly decade-long civil war.
Upadhyay's plain prose makes the political crisis all the more affecting.Pub Date: Feb. 9, 2006
ISBN: 0-618-51749-9
Page Count: 224
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2005
Share your opinion of this book
More by Samrat Upadhyay
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
by Tim O’Brien ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 28, 1990
It's being called a novel, but it is more a hybrid: short-stories/essays/confessions about the Vietnam War—the subject that O'Brien reasonably comes back to with every book. Some of these stories/memoirs are very good in their starkness and factualness: the title piece, about what a foot soldier actually has on him (weights included) at any given time, lends a palpability that makes the emotional freight (fear, horror, guilt) correspond superbly. Maybe the most moving piece here is "On The Rainy River," about a draftee's ambivalence about going, and how he decided to go: "I would go to war—I would kill and maybe die—because I was embarrassed not to." But so much else is so structurally coy that real effects are muted and disadvantaged: O'Brien is writing a book more about earnestness than about war, and the peekaboos of this isn't really me but of course it truly is serve no true purpose. They make this an annoyingly arty book, hiding more than not behind Hemingwayesque time-signatures and puerile repetitions about war (and memory and everything else, for that matter) being hell and heaven both. A disappointment.
Pub Date: March 28, 1990
ISBN: 0618706410
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin
Review Posted Online: Oct. 2, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 1990
Share your opinion of this book
More by Tim O’Brien
BOOK REVIEW
by Tim O’Brien
BOOK REVIEW
by Tim O’Brien
BOOK REVIEW
by Tim O’Brien
More About This Book
SEEN & HEARD
IN THE NEWS
SEEN & HEARD
by Julia Alvarez ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 1, 1991
Told through the points of view of the four Garcia sisters- Carla, Sandi, Yolanda and Sofia-this perceptive first novel by poet Alvarez tells of a wealthy family exiled from the Dominican Republic after a failed coup, and how the daughters come of age, weathering the cultural and class transitions from privileged Dominicans to New York Hispanic immigrants. Brought up under strict social mores, the move to the States provides the girls a welcome escape from the pampered, overbearingly protective society in which they were raised, although subjecting them to other types of discrimination. Each rises to the challenge in her own way, as do their parents, Mami (Laura) and Papi (Carlos). The novel unfolds back through time, a complete picture accruing gradually as a series of stories recounts various incidents, beginning with ``Antojos'' (roughly translated ``cravings''), about Yolanda's return to the island after an absence of five years. Against the advice of her relatives, who fear for the safety of a young woman traveling the countryside alone, Yolanda heads out in a borrowed car in pursuit of some guavas and returns with a renewed understanding of stringent class differences. ``The Kiss,'' one of Sofia's stories, tells how she, married against her father's wishes, tries to keep family ties open by visiting yearly on her father's birthday with her young son. And in ``Trespass,'' Carla finds herself the victim of ignorance and prejudice a year after the Garcias have arrived in America, culminating with a pervert trying to lure her into his car. In perhaps one of the most deft and magical stories, ``Still Lives,'' young Sandi has an extraordinary first art lesson and becomes the inspiration for a statue of the Virgin: ``Dona Charito took the lot of us native children in hand Saturday mornings nine to twelve to put Art into us like Jesus into the heathen.'' The tradition and safety of the Old World are just part of the tradeoff that comes with the freedom and choice in the New. Alvarez manages to bring to attention many of the issues-serious and light-that immigrant families face, portraying them with sensitivity and, at times, an enjoyable, mischievous sense.
Pub Date: May 1, 1991
ISBN: 0-945575-57-2
Page Count: 308
Publisher: Algonquin
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 1991
Share your opinion of this book
More by Julia Alvarez
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
More About This Book
PROFILES
APPRECIATIONS
© Copyright 2024 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Hey there, book lover.
We’re glad you found a book that interests you!
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Trouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Trouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Don’t fret. We’ll find you.